The Late Braking F1 Podcast - 2026 Bahrain GP in Malaysia Qualifying Review

Episode Date: October 3, 2026

2026 has a new pole sitter! Ben runs through all the action from today’s session at Sepang, from the dominant display at the front to growing doubts over Mercedes’ upgrades, and how the track’s abrasive surface could shape tomorrow’s race. Want more Late Braking? Support the show on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and get:Ad-free listeningFull-length bonus episodesPower Rankings after every raceHistorical race reviews& more exclusive extras!Don't forget! You can also gift a Late Braking Patreon subscription—perfect for loved ones or your own wish list. Choose anything from 1 month up to a full year of top-notch F1 content: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/latebrakingf1/gift⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Connect with Late Braking:You can find us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠X (Twitter)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Come hang out with us and thousands of fellow F1 fans in our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Discord⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ server and get involved in lively everyday & race weekend chats!Join our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠F1 Fantasy League⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and see if you can beat us! LEAGUE CODE: C6Y6R4ZUY02Get in touch any time at [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Thank you for listening to the Late Breaking F1 podcast. Make sure to check out new episodes every Wednesday and every Sunday. Welcome to the late breaking F1 podcast presented by me, Ben Hocking, here reviewing qualifying for the Bahrain Grand Prix held in Malaysia. I think I've got that right. There were a lot of references to that today, weren't there, folks? I didn't plan to start here, but the amount of times we got stats of, well, this driver's never qualified inside the top six of a Bahrain Grand Prix.

And my head going, well, they've never raced at the Bahrain Grand Prix. Why on earth is that? Oh, hang on a minute. We're in Malaysia. It's the Bahrain GP. Anyway, Max Verstappen taking pole position for this Grand Prix tomorrow. The first time this year that a non-Messides power-united car has managed to get pole position. and a very impressive one at that,

nearly three tenths, separating Max Verstappen back to, again, not a Mercedes-powered car, Lewis Hamilton for Ferrari. And yes, Vastappen and Hamilton on the front row of a grid, what could possibly go wrong? You have to go all the way back to P4 until you find Kimmy Antonelli,

not only the championship leader, but the first Mercedes-powered car, in what is an interesting top 10, because his teammate all the way down in eighth. We'll have plenty of time to get through all of those and indeed a lot, lot more going down throughout Q2 and Q1 as well. But let's start out front with the man of the moment, that being Max Verstappen, taking pole position again

by just under three tenths of a second. And oh boy, it was pretty damn good. This isn't one where he looked okay throughout Q1 and Q2 and then was able to pull a lap at the end of Q3, and we go, wow, where did he find that from? No, this was more of the, this looked like 2023. This was more dominance from Max Verstappen, in that it looked likely he was going to get pole from Q1, and then it looked even more likely when we went throughout Q2,

it looked even more likely again when we had the first runs of Q3, and then he decided just to extend that advantage out a little bit more in his second run of Q3, As it turns out, he didn't even need to. The lap he did in the first place would have been good enough as well for pole position. You know the scariest thing about this is that he could have been even quicker, which is a weird thing to say about one max for Stappen because he's already quick enough, but he didn't hook together his three best sectors.

If you take his best sectors from his first run and add them to his second run, he actually finds another couple of attempts on top of this. This could have easily been close to half a second separating himself and the Ferrari of Lewis Hamilton and indeed the rest of the field as well. I mean, Hamilton had at least a 10th on Hadjar. So Vastappen has taken a very dominant poll that could have looked even more dominant.

And credit to what Red Bull have been able to do here and the way in which they've, I don't want to say turn this around, but even with the absence of notable, upgrades in the last few Grand Prix, they found a way to be competitive. And I thought that it would be very limited to a certain type of track. Like they were competitive at Baku and they were competitive at Monza. And I was thinking, well, they might be somewhat competitive here.

But with a few more medium speed corners, a few quicker corners, particularly in the middle sector, they might start to struggle more than they have done at the last few Grand Prix. Absolutely not. Sector 1, Vastappan was thoroughly impressive and was the fastest driver. Sector 2, whilst Vastappan did give up a bit of time to Lewis Hamilton, it was only by a couple attempts. And when we get to sector three, and that's really the sector that we're looking at, outright pace in a straight line, he again is the fastest driver out there.

So clearly that Red Bull internal combustion engine doing something in that sector, but, and this was a line that we heard quite a lot in Baku, still very good in the corners. And Verstappen has proven that with his lap. It looked on the cards throughout practice, but the way in which he was able to find time where these other teams haven't necessarily been able to evolve at the same rate, really good.

And I mean, as he said in his post-quality interview, being quick in qualifying is one thing. Being able to translate that into race pace, that will be another thing entirely, especially around here where we do expect to see a lot of pit stops, a lot of tire wear. It is going to be the complete opposite to what we had in Baku. They are chalk and cheese because at Baku we were looking at cold tires, not a lot of tire where particularly in qualifying we saw multiple warm-up laps to try and get these tires into that sort of range of heat that they work at their best. Malaysia, it's so hot and the track is so – the track's surface is breaking up.

the point where it's actually the complete opposite issue. We're getting a lot of tire wear. We're going to get a lot of sliding. Tires are overheating quite quickly. And if practice is anything to go by, we aren't going to be seeing one-stop races tomorrow. Of course, the weather might also play a factor. But if it's a dry Grand Prix, we are going to see multiple stops per driver. So whether Vastappan can convert through to that, I don't know. Qualifying pace and race pace sometimes go hand in hand. Sometimes they don't, but you'd have to be a brave man not to back Max Westappen when he starts from pole position. His teammate isn't too far behind either. So Isaac Adja qualifies P3. Now he does have a five-place grid penalty, so that should drop him

down to eighth, but I'd call that a pretty good result. And Red Bull certainly would have taken that before the session started. P-8 does put him at least outside of the, um, the, um, the quagmire, let's call it, of the midfield. And being clear of that, making sure that he doesn't need to lose time being stuck behind some cars that he's definitely quicker than. We saw it in Baco, of course, with Antonelli. Like, Antonelli might have had pretty reasonable pace. But you start to get stuck behind these midfield drivers and you lose a lot of time to the point

where Cantonelli was about 15 seconds behind George Russell after three laps. you want to avoid that if you can. And the way in which Isaac Hadjar has qualified, he probably will have avoided that now. He will be clear of even the likes of Bortholeto and Lawson that he would have preferred not to be behind. So Hadjar's given himself comparatively less work to do tomorrow than perhaps he might have done.

If he'd qualified P7 or P8, then suddenly he is outside that top 10. and it's a tougher challenge. He'll still need to pull off some overtakes, but we saw him capable of doing that at Baku, so I wouldn't be surprised if he does make some forward progress. But yeah, good work from Hadjai. He is over four temps clear of his teammates,

so it's difficult to be overwhelmingly complimentary about what he's been able to do, but he is clear of everyone else who's not named Lewis Hamilton. I'm not sure exactly, I've seen this thrown around by a few that maybe Red Bull should have taken this penalty that Hajar is now taking when he was out of the car, i.e. when Liam Lawson was in the car at at St. Monza, and then at a track where clearly the Red Bull goes very well, Sopang, he wouldn't have to endure this five-place grid penalty. It is a bit of a shame, I guess.

I understand the logic of that. And I'd be interested to hear from you as to whether you think Red Bull should have seen this coming and actually, because the penalties don't relate to the driver, penalties relate to the car. So as soon as something was changed on Isaac Hadjar's car, regardless of who's sat in it, they will take the penalty. Could they have taken this a bit earlier on and therefore giving themselves a really good opportunity, it may be a 1-2 finish or a double podium finish again? Maybe. But even so, it's not of the cars that Hadjar can make his way back to where he's qualified. Mercedes, let's chat about them because this is an odd one.

Just fourth and eighth. So Antonelli will start fourth, George Russell down in eighth, about two and a half tenths, separating the two of them. And it's a confusing one, which gives me the unenviable task of trying to break this down when I myself am confused about this. So we've heard reports for a long time that Mercedes are going to bring an upgrade somewhere. And they've been holding this off and holding this off to the point where the last proper update that we had from Mercedes was it Canada. That was a while ago.

They didn't introduce any significant upgrades throughout the entire European season. But we knew something was coming. And whether it was going to be introduced at Baku or Singapore or in. indeed here. That was really the only question remaining. They've decided to use it here. I haven't got the number of upgrades exactly that they made, but I think it was around eight. So fully expecting, given the time they've had to work on this, that it would have a notable impact on track, given they are already quite consistently the fastest car anyway, that was a pretty terrifying prospect. And it hasn't happened for them. Now, throughout practice, they still looked relatively competitive,

and they might trust their race pace a little bit more than their qualifying pace. Indeed, if they can find a way to be superior on tire wear, they could still be in with a chance here. Wouldn't surprise me at all. But in terms of one lap pace, they were struggling. And it doesn't make a lot of sense to me because they weren't necessarily struggling in practice. In the final part of practice, Antonelli was fastest.

he had about three temps to everyone in the middle sector. We get to main qualifying, everyone else has made a big stride, Mercedes haven't. And I'm guilty of, and maybe I'm understandably guilty of this, given Mercedes track record, they have a history of playing down their chances and not showing their full hand until we get to the most important part of the weekend, i.e. qualifying. And I fought throughout practice where they were. but again, relatively competitive, there's still a bit more in here.

There's still a bit more than not showing us just yet. And then we get to Q1. It looks okay. Antonelli was P6, Russell a little bit further off. All right, there's only been one run. I still think they've got a little bit left in the tank. And then really Q2 was the first sign that actually, no, they don't.

They just haven't quite been able to optimize their, their car this weekend. Because it just didn't really get much better from that. Now, certainly Antonelli's weekend or Antonelli's session was compromised as a result of the track limits violation in Q2. But even so, didn't feel like they had quite enough. Antonelli, again, that track limit violation, which just to quickly mention,

I love that it's punished, by the way. Now, Antonelli still obviously had time and tires in order to get through to the final part of qualifying, but he made a mistake and he was later in the session somewhat punished for that because he only got one run in Q3 because that was the only set of tyres he had left that were brand new. And unlike Baku, there really was no chance of an old set or a use set being deployed in order to set a competitive lap time just wouldn't have happened. and maybe that's cost Antonelli a position or two. Still don't think it's cost in pole. But again, just a bit of a detail that.

I enjoy that being punished. But I figured there'd be more in this for Mercedes and I'm surprised that there isn't. George Russell kind of had words on this earlier in the weekend to say that he's unclear as to whether the upgrades are working effectively or not because this track and it's a very particular track with the surface is kind of just masking everything, it's hiding everything. And we might get to another track and it looks far better and we can say, well, those upgrades have been a success, but we can't tell that yet.

But a curious one. Curious one for Mercedes who you would have expected to at least have been maybe fast enough in the final sector, but the first sector, for example. like Antonelli on his one and only flying lap in Q3, about four temps down to Max Verstappen's lap at that point. And you look at the overall gap, it's ended up at five temps. So nearly all of that is in the first sector. It's not very long first sector. So back to the drawing board, I think, for the team.

And certainly for George Russell, who after, it's the duality of F1, I guess, after being on pole by, what was it, eight temps last week in Baku, by pretty much the same margin. He's off pole and down in eighth this weekend. That's F1. We try and predict it and we get it wrong 95% of the time, or in our case, pretty closer to 99% of the time. And that's why we love it.

You keep being surprised by all of this. Speaking of keep being surprised, Ferrari found their way to the front row of the grid. And that is with Lewis Hamilton, maybe experience counting for a lot here. I was really impressed with the way Lewis Hamilton developed throughout this weekend because for all the world it looked like Lewis Hamilton was going to be the slower of the two Ferrari drivers.

Certainly throughout practice and the early part of qualifying, I figured LeClaire probably just about has enough. Now, Hamilton, I think, just about got ahead in Q1. LeCler got ahead in Q2 though. And certainly throughout practice, I thought it was LeCler that was not by huge amount, maybe a 10th or two. I figured he might be the faster of the two. And then we get to Q3, and Lewis Hamilton pulls out an unbelievable middle sector. So as reference, Vestappen was the fastest in the first and final sectors.

The only sector he wasn't was the middle sector, which includes a lot of these fast sweeping corners, where I kind of expected another team that I haven't got onto yet to be quick, was instead Lewis Hamilton who was able to put a couple of attempts on Vastappen and indeed everyone else. He put about three attempts on his teammate just in that sector.

And ultimately that was the difference between him being back in this pack between maybe fourth and eighth where there's not a lot of separating them and instead being quite comfortably clear in second. Now that Ferrari power unit, whilst it has had a couple of upgrades so far this year, doesn't appear to be strong enough to compete with,

I mean, definitely the Red Bull power unit, definitely the Mercedes power unit. That's where a lot of Ferrari's time was sort of falling away. They were very good in the middle sector. They were fine in the first sector. It's that final sector that was killing them. And that's why ultimately Hamilton, whilst he did have a purple middle sector,

was still not really a threat for pole based on what Verstappen was able to do at the end of the lap. But yeah, Lewis Hamilton, very good indeed. And we know in terms of tire wear, and I've said this repeatedly over the years on this podcast, I think the most underrated element of Hamilton's game is his tire wear and his tire management. He does generally a very good job on it.

And I think it's going to be really important tomorrow. There's a reason why all of these teams have decided, or nearly all of these teams have decided, we aren't going to touch the hard tire until we get to the race because we had two sets of them and we're probably going to need them both. It's a reason for that. Let's take a quick break. On the other side, we'll get into McLaren, 6th and 7th,

Gassley and Bortoletto also making it through its Q3 and then all of the action from Q2 and Q1. Welcome back, everyone. Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri will, well, I mean, they'll be bumped up a position each, but they qualified sixth and seventh. Norris just about ahead of Piastri, and I really do mean that.

That's five thousandths of a second separating the two of them. But ultimately, both of them over six tenths away from what Max Verstappen was able to produce. Again, just to emphasise the point about me being surprised and uncertain about how this weekend is going to pan out, I didn't think there'd be this far away. Now, if you were listening to our preview,

you'll know I didn't put Norris or Piastri in my podium prediction, but I figured they wouldn't be too far behind. And again, who knows, maybe they won't be too far behind. Maybe they'll be on it. But in terms of qualifying pace, surprisingly not there. And just to add to it, the middle sector is where all of these medium to high speed corners exist. and that's been McLaren's calling card all year. It's been the determining factor on whether they've been competitive at a track or not.

There's a reason why they were competitive at Zambor. There's a reason why they were competitive at Hungary. There's a reason they weren't competitive at Monza and not so much at Baku either. These lower-speed corners they really struggle at, these higher-speed corners they do pretty well at. and Malaysia, I think, is a fairly, Sopang is a fairly all-round track. So I'm not, I didn't think that they would get back to those,

that winning sort of way that they had, those couple of tracks mentioned. But I did think they would at least be a factor here. And their struggles kind of all over the track, but their biggest struggle at the moment is that middle sector. They aren't competitive enough there. They're doing okay. and sort of the final part of the lap, but the middle part of the lap, they're just not there,

and I don't really understand why. And it's why I'm very excited about this race tomorrow. It really does feel like a 10-year absence from this circuit and the unique challenges of Sapang mean that the form book is kind of a bit dodgy. And I certainly left practice sessions this weekend less confident than I normally would be. I don't know how it's going to pan out. And Piastri, it looked like, had the slight advantage of the two Mercedes

as we went throughout this session, maybe somewhat surprisingly being able to use the low grip conditions. Norris ultimately gets that lap in at the end of Q3 to just about finish ahead, which I was going to say it would infuriate Piastri. That's definitely too much, especially for Piastri's demeanor I'm not sure he does infuriated all that often,

and it is over sixth and seventh. But Piastri certainly looked like he was going to be the one who qualified best of the McLaren duo to take that. Have that taken away from him at the last, that will be a frustration for him. But yeah, the bigger frustration is just going to be that this team isn't quite there. I suspect, and this is just a hunch,

and somewhat based on practice data, I think they might do slightly better in race trim. I think their tire wear is a little bit better than some of their competitors, particularly Ferrari. I will admit I am worried about Ferrari and their ability to stay where they've qualified. There were some pretty bad signs from practice

that those tyres were dying very, very quickly. With McLaren, they had quite a, they had a couple of very long runs. I think Lando Norris's was on the soft tire for a good number of laps. For the most part, kind of kept them alive. So I would have more confidence that maybe McLaren will find some of this back in terms of race pace. But if that's enough to, I don't know, beat a Ferrari, then okay. I don't know if it's going to be enough to compete with, say, Mercedes or Red Bull,

in which case a podium might be a tough challenge for them. But, yeah, disappointing. disappointing for McLaren. Leaves us in terms of Q3 just with Pierre Gazley and Gabrielle Bortoletto. No surprise to see Pierre Gasley here in 9th given that seems to be his position this year. It's just taking advantage of anything he can in terms of leading the midfield and then hoping something happens to one of the front runners. So here he was probably hoping Hadjar qualifies 847. and therefore he gets a bump in position

as a result of that. I think realistically, whilst we know Gassley very recently competed for pole position and got pole position at Monza, I don't think it was ever on the cards that the midfield were ever going to be in a comparative position to the front runners.

I mean, Gazzley's two seconds away from pole position in that final session. And I never got the sense that there was going to be a midfield car that could keep up. But P9 is, he's in an Alpine for goodness sake. P9 is a very good result. He's half a second faster than Bortoletto in Q3.

He's got through to Q3 where obviously a lot of his rivals haven't. And who knows? I mean, P9 is not a bad starting spot when we have a very uncertain Grand Prix. And I mean that whether it's dry or raining. Like there's still a very good chance that all of this discussion about tireware

on the dry tires is for nothing because we get a race that requires intermediate or wet weather tires, in which case carnage could ensue in front of him. And he might be able to make up positions. Wouldn't be the first time. I can refer you back to the Brazilian GP a couple of years ago, where Stappen obviously won that race. He found himself on the podium alongside his Alpine teammate Esteban Ocon. So I think he'll be happy with the result. Certainly, When you've got enough pace in Q1 to offer up your services to be a toe to your teammate, you're doing a good job. But Bortoletto can absolutely be happy with 10th as well.

I didn't quite think that Audi were going to find themselves into Q3. So Bortoletto, I can say, has exceeded my expectations. I thought, based on practice, the racing balls might have a bit of an advantage over them. and indeed Bortoleto had to knock out Lawson in order to get to Q3. But yeah, I was I was pretty impressed with the way in which they attacked the first sector. Bortoletto was the fastest driver at one point in that first sector. Middle sector, as you would expect with the amount of corners. That's kind of Audi's playground this year.

They were good there as well. The only thing that's letting them down, unsurprisingly, is the power unit, which needs to be prevalent in the final sector. That's where they're losing a lot of their time. But still enough to make it through to Q3. So, yeah, Bortoleto will have a chance at a point or two, I'm sure. Holkenberg, less certain there, because he's all the way down in 17. That will become P-15 as a result of two penalties for Limblad and Collopinto,

but even so, he's got more work to do than expected. He just didn't hook together that lap in Q1. He had the sectors to do it, but he didn't have the overall. all lap time and you heard his expression after the fact. His disappointment, can't repeat his message, but he knew he'd missed an opportunity to get through to Q2. I still think Bortoleto might have had the pace on him, in which case maybe he wasn't making it through to Q3, but he's certainly given up positions to at least three cars

that I think he should have beaten. Speaking of Q2 and Q1, so both racing balls knocked out in Q2. and what has quite often been the leading midfield car in qualifying this year. I mean, we've had a lot of qualifying stats about both Limblud and Lawson, the way in which they've been able to make it through to the final part of qualifying, not able to do so here. Lawson certainly had the better of the two opportunities as a result of not having a grid penalty

and even Arvid Limbludd helping Lawson out to try and get enough in that final sector to make it, through. Ultimately, not quite. The problem for Lawson's lap is that his first sector wasn't good enough. It was actually slower than Limblud's lap. Of course, Limblud didn't actually complete a lap in the end, but he did attack the first sector as if he was going to. He wasn't as quick as Limblad was. So if he finds a 10th or 2 there, that might be enough to make it through. But I'm maybe a bit surprised by racing balls overall that on a track where clearly Red Bull are very, very strong, Racing balls, it doesn't follow through to them.

It usually does. Like, if Red Bull are fast somewhere, generally racing balls would be at the top of the midfield. If Red Bull are struggling a bit more, maybe racing balls are struggling a bit more, a bit more of a disparity here, which did surprise me. Limblud, I guess we didn't have a true reflection

on what his pace was based on, based on him starting from the back. So managed to make it through to Q2 and then really thereafter was just used as a tool to try and get Lawson Fruit to Q3. The team, very appreciative of that, if you heard the team radio, but ultimately not being able to get it done. But from the back of the grid, I don't know whether it's going to be enough for points. Might depend, again, on how much carnage we get.

But I expect him to make some early quick progress through some of these slower cars. One car that wasn't quite as slow as maybe we were. thinking it would be. Aston Martin, Alonzo 12th, stroll 14th. First and foremost, pretty sad state of affairs that this is considered to be a pretty okay result for Aston Martin this year, but sadly it is.

Good work from Alonzo, about three and a half times faster than his teammate, even though it is only just two positions in the end. And he's not a million miles away from making it through to Q3. I, again, confusing. weekend. They weren't that bad in a straight line. And that could be set up related and maybe they're giving away more than they would like to through the corners in order to make up for that

and to be quick enough in a straight line to compete with everyone else. But where you would normally expect to see, we heard all the stats last weekend about how they were slower than an F2 car in a straight line, they were okay. They were fine. It wasn't their strength, but it wasn't holding them back as much as we have seen before. Alonzo's, and it's kind of carried through from practice, like Alonzo looked pretty reasonable, both in terms of one lap pace and indeed some race runs as well. Looked reasonable enough. Certainly not better than this.

I didn't expect them to make Q3, and by having two cars in Q2, that's progress. That's where Aston Baird are at the moment. It's progress. so well done to them both. Not as much progress for Huss down in 18th and 19th. You kind of knew they were expecting a struggle to make it through to Q2 when you saw how early they were going out on track.

Each team has a very limited supply of the Red Bull soft tire and most teams were trying to save as many sets as possible for the later parts of qualifying. Hasse clearly understood they weren't going to get to the final part of qualifying,

in which case they might use, might as well use up more tires early on to try and at least get through to Q2. And we saw Ockon and Behrman, they were out on track far earlier than anyone else in the final part of qualifying. Still not enough though. Bearman's finished 18th,

not too far away from getting out of the drop zone. Ockon a couple more attempts back from that. again, more disappointment for Esteban Ockon because he appeared the quicker at the two Hascares for out practice and the early part of qualifying. But it's Behrman who ultimately delivers that more impressive lap later on where Ockon can't follow, likely at least part of the reason why Behrman will be there next year and Ockon won't be there next year. But yes, 18th and 19th, I don't expect much from them.

nor do I expect much from Cadillac, who have kind of reverted back to the last two spots for tomorrow. Again, they'll move forward a couple based on grid penalties, but pace-wise doesn't surprise me at all. It will be a shame, obviously, because they showed a little bit more in Baku, but I think at a track where tyres are more prevalent, this doesn't seem an area that Cadillac have cracked yet.

And with Aston Martin obviously improved. it looks like it could be a bit of a lonely day for both of their drivers, but hey, it's going to be hot. There's every chance that one of their two drivers, or both of them won't even make it to the end of the race, if history is anything to go by. Yeah, that's pretty much every team covered, apart from Williams. Full credit to Carlos Sines for P13.

It won't get a lot of chatter, but that is, I think, a pretty good result. He has quite comprehensively outqualified Alex Albert in Q1, and then able to out-qualify a few drivers in Q2, I think that is an absolute maximised session for Williams and for Carlos Sines. Again, it's worrying that that's the case because we are just a week off from their big upgrade

that they brought in Baku, and it's still not enough for them to at least compete with the top of the midfield. They're in the mix, but they aren't fighting. with the likes of Alpine at the moment. Bit of a disappointment. But Carlos Sines, I think, has done about as much as he can possibly do here.

Alex Alburn has only just out-qualified Valtry Bottas to avoid some more embarrassment there, but he's going to have a long way to go. Just enough time to give out a driver of the session. Max Verstappen certainly seems like a candidate here. So does Lewis Hamilton, looking a bit further down the grid. I would put Carlos Sines in there. I know that will sound weird,

but I do think that is the absolute most Williams had in it. But I will go for the pole man here. I will go for Max Verstappen. Even again, knowing there was a little bit more time left in the car, he has still pretty comfortably outqualified the field here. And to be fastest in two of the three sectors, be fastest in Q1, fastest in Q2. This doesn't, yeah, this didn't take me too long to decide

that Vastappen is probably driver of the same. session. But will he be driver of the day tomorrow? A lot of that will hinge on whether he can for the first time this year get a race win for himself and the team. It's been an odd one seeing Vastappen not take any race wins to this point in the year, but tomorrow certainly represents his best opportunity to change that so far. Is it going to rain? Are we going to get 100 pit stops? That is all to be decided. I'm certain it's going to be a very interesting. intriguing prospect of a Grand Prix. And of course, we'll be here to review it tomorrow,

where Sam will join me. So the two of us will be able to dissect everything that happens from the race, give out our usual driver of the day, worst driver of the day, our moment of the race, and let you know what we think about what had just happened. If you want to get more late breaking, there's more late breaking out there. You just have to sign up to our Patreon.

The link is in our description. We'll of course have power rankings on Monday where we go through every single driver and give them a rating between 1 and 10. So we try to cover as many drivers and teams as we possibly can in our race review, but inevitably one or two are going to get missed. So if your favourite driver hasn't been discussed,

they will definitely be discussed on power rankings on Monday. Historic race review every single month if you are on our middle or upper tier. We've got beer with braking. That was recorded quite a bit earlier. the month, but as usual, an absolute nonsense session that some people seem to enjoy for some reason. And of course, two bonus episodes every single month, one of which we have just very recently recorded. That's going to do it from me. I'll be back tomorrow. Until then,

keep breaking late.